Internode CTO quits iiNet after two years

news Long-time Internode chief technology officer John Lindsay has resigned from a similar position at the company’s owner iiNet, just two years after iiNet bought the South Australian ISP.

When iiNet announced it would buy Internode in late December 2011, the two companies were careful to highlight their plans for the South Australian ISP led by well-known industry figure Simon Hackett to remain independent from its new parent. “This is another iiNet acquisition and Internode will just disappear, right?” stated a question posted as part of Internode’s frequently asked questions document for the transaction. “No, it isn’t,” came the answer from Hackett. “Internode will be remaining as a separate operating company within the group, with its own identity and its own staff. I am staying at the helm of Internode as is the rest of the management structure of the Internode & Agile company group.”

At the time, Hackett emphasised that his new status as a major shareholder of iiNet itself would mean that Internode would not “just disappear into iiNet without trace”, and that there was little reason for the company to harmonise its broadband plans and offerings with those of iiNet, as other companies subsumed into iiNet — such as Netspace, Westnet and AAPT — had in the past.

However, iiNet has increasingly taken a number of steps to integrate Internode within its larger overall business over the past two years.

Lindsay noted on his website that the last two and a bit years have been a career highlight for him, “selling Internode, building iiNet a global IP network with around 150 gigabits of lit submarine capacity, rolling out Australia’s first live VDSL2 network in Canberra, buying Adam Internet, leading and managing over 150 highly talented and very geeky staff, growing the WiFi network to over 1,000 access points and being the CTO of a billion dollar listed company”.

“It’s been a privilege to work with the iiNet exec team who are the best service provider management group in the business,” wrote Lindsay.

However, the executive also noted that he was “almost double platinum with one airline and gold with two others”. “I’m not going to miss the travel nor the stress of being responsible for about half a billion dollars of costs every year,” Lindsay said. The executive wrote that he was “taking a break from the corporate world and setting up as a consultant”, planning to “spend lots of time working with start-up and early stage businesses”.

At an indeterminate time over the past several years, Internode appears to have removed the “management” page from its website, where profiles of its senior executives were detailed. This and the other changes listed above appear to signal that the company is not remaining as a separate entity within the iiNet Group, as Hackett had stated following the acquisition.

opinion/analysis
Look, I don’t want to be too harsh here. John Lindsay has been one of the most respected executives in Australia’s telecommunications industry for several decades. He’s worked for iiNet before and clearly deserves a long break from high-level duties. This is a personal choice, and it’s not reflective of the state of affairs at Internode or iiNet. We hope Lindsay enjoys the next stage of his career and we give thanks for his efforts.

However, it’s also important to hold those in power to their words. I remind readers that Hackett wrote in December 2011: “Internode will be remaining as a separate operating company within the group, with its own identity and its own staff. I am staying at the helm of Internode as is the rest of the management structure of the Internode & Agile company group.”

Just two years later, that statement is increasingly false. Internode now appears to be being directly managed by iiNet, its management team having largely departed, and its product set is increasingly becoming synchronised with that of iiNet. As I’ve written quite a few times, it is my opinion that this kind of “Borg” integration behaviour by iiNet has directly contributed to the ongoing decline in competition and harmonisation of product lines in Australia’s telecommunications industry. It’s only a matter of time until iiNet takes the next step and brings the rest of Internode’s products into line with other ISPs in its stable such as Netspace, Westnet, OzEmail, AAPT and so on. And that is a sad thing for innovation in Australia’s ISP industry indeed.

If you think I’m wrong, ask yourself how many new broadband plans you’ve seen launched in Australia recently. It used to be we used to see new plans released virtually every month. Now, the major ISPs — Telstra, Optus, iiNet and TPG — are basically content to update their plans once a year, if that. Great.

76 Comments

Not entirely convinced that “lack of innovation” is happening here – or maybe more accurately that a “lack of innovation” is the fault of the consolidation of ISP’s.

Costs of Internet services have remained stable (you’re hard pressed to get a Broadband connection for less than $49.95 per month), but the amount of quota you get with that is astronomical compared to only half a decade ago and continues to grow.

That said, I’m not convinced that cost/quota should be classed as “innovation” unless it’s the introduction of new product – decreased cost of supply seems to be the driver behind this (often possible because these companies have huge customer bases and more purchasing power).

The “up in the air” nature of the NBN over the past 5 years hasn’t helped matters – why would you invest a great deal in “innovative” new ways of delivering Internet when the Government plans to do a nation-wide infrastructure rollout?

We’ve seen progression from 3G -> 4G on the mobile front (along with vastly improved mobile data rates/packages), Naked DSL becoming a “common” offering at most ISP’s, and IPTV also offered at most in the last five years. That’s not too bad in terms of “new things” for consumers.

If we still had hundreds of “little” ISP’s, I’m not convinced things would actually be any ‘better’ than they are now – having lots of “new plans” isn’t necessarily the best measuring stick here – ISP’s were still updating their plans around once (maybe twice) a year, you just had a lot more of them doing it, and the majority of the time they were just playing catch-up with the others, not actually offering anything new themselves.

Look at the requirements for Jiva to understand why:
– An existing fixed line service (i.e.: Telstra line) attached to an eligible exchange
– You must subscribe to a shared spectrum service (i.e.: there is no “naked DSL” on offer)
– You must use the provided modem
– You pay for all tech support

The first condition all on its own is severely limiting the market penetration that Jiva can possibly achieve.

What sort of “innovation” is available in the petrol-selling world? We have quieter bowsers, anti-competitive “buy food from our supermarket to receive petrol at a discount” offers, streamlined apron layout so that more cars can pile through to collect petrol every hour, and you try to reduce the queues on the road during peak times.

You can’t change the petrol itself, or the way the petrol is delivered. The only “innovation” is the marketing style of “innovation” which is simply, “different ways of packaging the same stuff we were selling yesterday.”

Innovation in the broadband space will only happen as technology changes. Otherwise you just have the same set of people selling the same product with different wrapping. A bunch of marketroids engaging in an onanastic orgy of product relabelling.

I think Internode could of invested better more in innovations. They stopped

There was a time Internode was the leader in the market

Around 2006 the company took a different directions and began tilting downwards. Firstly It deciding stop having casual sex with an attractive hot geeky bf/gf and dating MILF with children was just more attractive options

What that means the target market was forgotten about and abandoned. The focused shifted onto the familys and general users, Meanwhile the geeky gf/bf became was lonely, depressed and took this breakup personally by writing angry post on Whirlpool or Internode feedback email saying “You don’t love the internet or me no more. Why you dating a hot milf which doesnt love you?” .

Internode customers are probably more passionate then IINET fanboi

It sad to see something like this happen both to Adam and Internode. Because means less competition and doesnt keep IINET on its toes

How long is such a corporate promise meant to last? Clearly two years isn’t enough for Renai. Would 5 years make you happy? A decade? Two decades? Where do you draw the line?

Any business that stands still is going to get rolled over by the competition. Therefore sticking to two year old decisions for the sake of sticking to them is just plain bad business. That must apply doubly for a dynamic Industry such as is all things Internet right now.

Realistically in a commercial world, the only promises we should rely on are those written in a contract.

We also know that execs have to make calming pronouncements during any change otherwise they get run down by panic-stricken Whirlpooleans. That’s all you should have read into it at the time. Soothing sounds, fluffy kittens, warm toast and such.

It’s pretty hard to argue that Simon Hackett isn’t now in an even stronger position to improve Australian Broadband than when he owned Internode. I guess time will tell on that one.

As for JSL; let’s not forget he’s resigned from iiNet before – in 2000, to go work for Internode! I couldn’t resist his random offer of free beer and a chat for whirlpoolians one evening, a couple of months ago. I have personally benefitted from his push to complete the TransACT VDSL2 rollout, as well as the free beer. Best of luck to him!

Simon was very deceptive (or misinformed?) with his statements. Internode ceased being an independent entity around March 2012. Back end systems were Integrated (with iiNets) with zero notice to front line staff around this time. I was transferring from iiNet to Internode around this time and was notified by a senior staff member who was having difficulty with my order, It was that Internode not only had the ability to view my iiNet account, that my iiNet account was the cause of the problem – The systems were so heavily integrated at this point that they were completely unable to transfer my iiNet service to Internode as I was considered to already have a service with Internode – and he, nor any of his staff (or his manager) was told of this integration – my order was what led the Internode staffers to discover the integration.

I have since spoke with a mate who left the company mid last year who was in a relatively senior position. IiNet completely gutted the Internode training processes and started placing iiNet team leaders in Internode departments as early as Feb 2012 and around this time removed the majority of Internodes HR department. There has also been no “upper” management since this time, apparently team leaders and managers were reporting directly to iiNet senior management.

> IiNet completely gutted the Internode training processes and started placing iiNet team leaders in Internode departments as early as Feb 2012 and around this time removed the majority of Internodes HR department. There has also been no “upper” management since this time, apparently team leaders and managers were reporting directly to iiNet senior management.

Being an Internode Alumni. I can say Internode training was great, very strong customer focus, clever and proactive, which something unique to any other employer in the IT industry and telecommunication sector.

Renai, your assumptions on this Story is clearly very false on two reasons:

1.) This has absolutely nothing to do with Simon Hackett nor John Lindsay leaving their posts, if Internode were to bring in most of their Plans in with iiNet’s the previous incompetent Federal Labor Government are to blame for their current debt they created since taking Office in 2007 (The last 4 Deficits in the last 4 Budgets they had) which the LIBS have the massive Job of repaying back.

2.) iiNet updated their Plans last Month – So your claim of them updating them at least every year is very false, they update/revise their Plans quite regularly Renai.

I would suggest in future reference if you have a need to continue making up false assumptions regarding Internode then give this whole regard Node and their Teams a perminate rest.

Apart from that aside, I wish John Lindsay all the best in his future endevours and I would like to give thanks to all the great Work he has put into Internode over the years :).

I think you need to do some proper research on Articles back to December 2011 to what then Opposition Communications Spokeman Malcolm Turnbull quoted of why Internode was sold to iiNet Lionel.

He states quite clearly that the Incompetent Labor Government are ones to blame (Including the NBN) and all the Money they completely wasted on this Project without proper thinking into it since taking Office in 2007 – No wonder why at the present moment why we are held to ransom by this so-called Telstra Monopoly we are in now with some Plans with ISP’s are still quite expensive.

What you and Mr Renai need to realise is how much this lovely Country of ours is in debt thanks to the previous Labor Government and the massive Tasks ahead for the LIBS to pay back the debt and get this Country back to Surplus again, if Labor was still in Government Today well Internode/iiNet would be by far in a worse position with this Labor debt Today.

That’s why it has everything to do with Internode/iiNet as they are the same Company, but as I have said, you need to do some research of what was quoted by Communication Minister Malcolm Turnbull in December 2011, he states clearly why Internode was bought out by iiNet…

I wouldn’t be all surprised down the Track iiNet buys out TPG as well in the future – I believe they will eventually with the current state of the Economy that it is at the moment…

‘I think you need to do some proper research on Articles back to December 2011 to what then Opposition Communications Spokeman Malcolm Turnbull quoted of why Internode was sold to iiNet Lionel.”

You seem to be confusing the POI decision by the ACCC with the Labor party.
As to other things said by Malcolm Turnbull, sorry, he is a liar, and you are gullible for believing his obvious lies.

“He states quite clearly that the Incompetent Labor Government are ones to blame (Including the NBN) and all the Money they completely wasted on…”

Well that’s what Malcolm says, Simon said something different. ie. the ACCC decision to increase the number of POI.

“No wonder why at the present moment why we are held to ransom by this so-called Telstra Monopoly we are in now with some Plans with ISP’s are still quite expensive.”
We are held at ransom now because Mr Turnbull has put himself ahead of the Australian people and we have been put into the position of having to buy the copper. Previously we were being ripped off by Telstra because Howard was dumb enough not to separate them from the copper network when he sold them.

“What you and Mr Renai need to realise is how much this lovely Country of ours is in debt thanks to the previous Labor Government and the massive Tasks ahead for the LIBS to pay back the debt and get this Country back to Surplus again,”
They only way the Libs have ever been in surplus is by selling assets and in doing so causing more problems for Australia. I don’t see the Libs producing any surpluses like the promised. If anything they are running up debt even faster.

“That’s why it has everything to do with Internode/iiNet as they are the same Company, but as I have said, you need to do some research of what was quoted by Communication Minister Malcolm Turnbull in December 2011, he states clearly why Internode was bought out by iiNet…”
I am well aware of everything Malcolm has said, but it seems your are ignorant of everything but Malcolm’s words. I suggest you do some research and not be spoon fed crap by Turnbull.

“I wouldn’t be all surprised down the Track iiNet buys out TPG as well in the future – I believe they will eventually with the current state of the Economy that it is at the moment…”
Yep, say hi to the rest of boganville for me.

The only I have to say is – Don’t believe anything Labor has ever said in their Lifetime, cause it seems your Spoon-fed and obsessed with that liar Stephen Conroy. What Malcolm Turnbull has stated back December 2011 are the true facts which Labor nor you won’t admit that I’m right.

As for the LIBS getting this Country back to Surplus, here’s a Newsflash for ya – Since Federal Labor took Office from 2007 to last year all they have done is created the 4 worst Deficit Budgets in history, when the Howard Government were in Office, they had the 4 most surpluses, so your very incorrect on those assumptions made just there.

I can guarantee you with the LIBS now in Office this Country will be back to surplus within Time, not like spoon-fed Labor and Stephen Conroy that has a habit of wasting hard earned Taxpayers Money.

No I am not actually. I usually vote Liberal. This time they have it so wrong however I couldn’t vote for them.

“The only I have to say is – Don’t believe anything Labor has ever said in their Lifetime, cause it seems your Spoon-fed and obsessed with that liar Stephen Conroy”

I don’t. I look at policies independent of who puts them forward and judge them on their merits.

“What Malcolm Turnbull has stated back December 2011 are the true facts which Labor nor you won’t admit that I’m right”

Don’t be spoon fed by Malcolm Turnbull, he is a liar.

“As for the LIBS getting this Country back to Surplus, here’s a Newsflash for ya – Since Federal Labor took Office from 2007 to last year all they have done is created the 4 worst Deficit Budgets in history, when the Howard Government were in Office, they had the 4 most surpluses, so your very incorrect on those assumptions made just there.”

I made no assumptions. I stated that Howard achieved those surplus through sale of assets. If he didn’t sell the assets he would have been in deficit.

“I can guarantee you with the LIBS now in Office this Country will be back to surplus within Time, not like spoon-fed Labor and Stephen Conroy that has a habit of wasting hard earned Taxpayers Money”

No, you actually can’t do anything of the sort. All you are doing is spouting rhetorical crap. Look, this thread is about Internode, not your love for and gullibility when it comes to political parties. Quite frankly they are all crap.

How is Malcolm Turnbull a liar, and how exactly did the LIBS get what so wrong? The fact that they are trying to save, not waste Taxpayers Money like spoon-fed Labor has??

And again your Statement on Malcolm Turnbull is utterly false, he cannot lie after he clearly stated over 2 years ago that Federal Labor has wasted so much Money on this NBN Project without putting more thought into it and it’s nowhere near half finished yet…

How can you call Mr Turnbull a liar based on those clear facts? Mr Conroy is a bigger liar than Turnbull sorry to say.

I might add to the conversation. Alot of people forget there was rolling period of disaster since 2008 and money was being spent disaster relief and, either replacing or repairing damaged infrastructure

Please get back on topic. Poor Renai will have a Renai mod failure attack in the morning

Yes, sorry, I don’t really want to talk politics in here. I am sick of …. (how to be polite… no stuff it)… complete dumb ignorant crap like this guy is posting. I don’t care about the politics of the NBN, I wish every politician would bugger off and they would just get on with it. But there is always some derp going “but Malcolm said…”

“How is Malcolm Turnbull a liar, and how exactly did the LIBS get what so wrong?”

He has continual been deceptive and out right lies in some cases. I am not going into detail, we have been discussing all aspects of Australian’s communications network upgrade for 6 years, play catch up yourself by reading older articles. Actually many believe it is Turnbull who is wasting the money. He has decided a course of action he wants to take for political, not technical, nor monetary reasons, and has been massaging the truth ever since to justify his stance.

“And again your Statement on Malcolm Turnbull is utterly false, he cannot lie after he clearly stated over 2 years ago that Federal Labor has wasted so much Money on this NBN Project without putting more thought into it and it’s nowhere near half finished yet… ”

No it isn’t nor is it meant to be half finished, nor have they wasted money. Even his review shows they haven’t wasted money. His claims of $20B waste is total rubbish, they have spent no where near that and much of the money spent was for the transit network, satelites and wireless, all of which he needs for his plan.

“How can you call Mr Turnbull a liar based on those clear facts? Mr Conroy is a bigger liar than Turnbull sorry to say.”
Actually no. I can honestly say Malcolm Turnbull has been much more deceptive than Conroy has been.
Look, this will be my last reply to you. You obviously have not background in the entire NBN to date and seem to base your entire belief system in what Malcolm says. Really, if I wanted to listen to uninformed garbage I’d go read posters who support Alan Jones or Andrew Bolt.

Do yourself a favour, instead on listening to Malcolm Turnbull and say “but Malcolm said this”, go and read some of the documents and analysis by various experts in the field and decide for yourself rather than being “spoon fed” Malcolm rubbish. I’d suggest starting with someone like Paul Budde, he is pretty easy to follow and has been writing regularly on the topic.

Sorry Adam, I give up and am done here, only to say I don’t believe for one second that Malcolm Turnbull is a liar, and the fact both Lionel and Mr Renai need to learn the fact that they both support a Labor NBN which is far more expensive where the proof is actually there and the figures show that not much proper thought was put into this Project at a cost in which in the process are sending many ISP’s broke.

As I said the LIBS figures do not lie as Labor does – The proof is in Pudding and Lionel’s assumptions are a load of utter Garbage and false, just watch when TPG is bought out by a takeover via iiNet in the future thanks to Labor’s unnecessary blowout costs of the NBN.

Those figures there you provided are actually that of Labor which Malcolm Turnbull admitted was a cost blowout by them, the LIBS NBN was to be a cost of $29B until they revealed that cost blowout in the News.

So it wasn’t a lie, simply a miscalculation thanks to incompetent Labor Alex.

Welcome back, that was quick… nothing like to conviction to one’s word…

So let’s get this straight… what you are saying is, that it’s totally acceptable for one side of politics to over-estimated the others policy costs by as much as $75.5B and under-estimate their own by $11.5B (so ‘up to’ $87B of totally “acceptable” miscalculations)?

But even better, then it’s also acceptable to totally blame the others for one’s own (mis)calculations and claims…?

Regardless of any political connotations or partiality, that is amazing logic…

It was obvious it was going to happen. Each other ISP was merge with the same promises, then ruined by iiNet. I ran from several. I am still with Internode, simply because there is nowhere decent left to run. That said, even though the overall quality of the Internode network has been impacted by the integration with iiNet, iiNet’s network has greatly improved from the previous times it had been inflicted upon me

On that, good job John. Let’s hope they keep the standards up and don’t start skimping on provisioning again (the reasons I had left in the past)

The difference between the old staff and the new is immediately obvious. The old staff understood what they were doing, they wouldn’t get you to do stupid things and it was obvious when they got you to do things that they were problem solving and there were reasons for what you were doing.
When I have been unfortunate enough to get newer guys or iiNet guys on the support line it’s a pain in the arse. Getting you to do obviously useless things because they really don’t know what the f… they are doing and likely just following a problem solving flowchart. Sorry, effective problem solving isn’t like that, it is best with understanding of what you are doing.

Precisly the issue. There seem to be now more support desk people who get you to damn stupid things.

For example. Problem. No DSL sync. Go through all the usual tests, again… always do the obvious before ringing, but that’s fine. Then starts getting you to change user name and password on modem. Starts trying to get you to change your PC wireless or network card settings… Unfortunately I am not rude enough to tell them they don’t know what the hell they are doing and to put me through to someone who does, so I have to go through the useless exercise and wait for them to give up. They will usually then promise to ring back after talking to XYZ. Doesn’t happen so try again the next day and hopefully get someone with a clue.

I myself was in a similar view that IIborg weren’t friendly and immediately to grab some popcorn

Like yourself on whirlpool my crazy ideas and predictive speculation was dismissed by staff and whirlpoolians that IInet only wanted the global Agile communications, Internode’s SMB, Government and Corporate profitable client list. You could speculate that the domestic home customers of Internode and profit for domestic product was in a decline

*popcorn* It happened
*play game of thrones theme song*

Both Simon and Jims in my opinion are the heart of Internode.

Next departure will be Michael Kratz then its all over in the “Game of Internets”

With Simon gone and Jim gone. There really are very much reason to stick around and the fun is gone

Reason why I suggest this will happen looking at other companies examples. Bevan Slattery when he resigned from being CEO of PIPE networks this had impact on other original staff members following him to NextDC or other business ventures. Because the new owners TPG had big impact on the team company moral, visions and future direction

Lol Alex, I’m simply responding to 2 Articles here Published by Renai which I do agree with.

The point being is that Renai continues to bag both John and Simon for leaving their posts where as the real People he should be blaming for this is the Australia Labor Party and their very massive Budget hole they have left behind.

Why is it that Companies that AAPT and 3 cease to even exist anymore? I’ll tell you exactly Alex – The fact that yourself and some others here including Renai continue to support and defend a Labor expensive NBN Project that has and is sending ISP’s broke to the Bone like AAPT and 3 as I said by a Labor blowout that was calculated and admitted by the LIBS in the News.

If anything as I mentioned, if thing keep the way they are going, TPG will be next on iiNet’s takeover List – Facts don’t lie.

“Labor’s debt” and the federal budget balance have as much to do with how iinet and internode integrate as a butterfly flapping its wings in Brazil. In any event, we have now had the opportunity to read your assertion several times, no need to cut and paste it further.

Internode still remains a seperate Brand, iiNet Reps can help by answering questions in other ISP’s Forums – For example, I see them in the Netspace Forum, even in the Internode Forum, they can do that as long it’s a Parent Brand they own of them.

OZ_Bluey76, I think you will find we aren’t discussing company ownership or branding, but the fact that Internode are not the separate company owned by iiNet that they said would be the case during the buyout. That the have merged so closely now they are just another front face for the same company. There is very little left of Internode to differentiate it from iiNet. The networks are merged, the plans adjusted to be the same, support integrated, management is now iiNet management.

Not all Plans are the same, take a another look on the Internode page on Whirlpool Lionel – Most of them are pretty much different except the Business Plan Page which is inline of iiNet’s.

I’m aware that Management is now iiNet’s, but Internode has it’s Call Centre (Customer Service Help Desk in Adelaide) which is separate to iiNet’s Support in Perth and operate seperately as 2 different Brands so it’s not really integrated.

Sorry, beg to differ, they are integrated. Depending on the time of day you are often put through to Perth. I an Internode customer and I am on an iiNet DSLAM, running on the iiNet network. They are two different BRANDS, yes, but they are now pretty much integrated. There are very small differences in the plans, much smaller than there used to be, it doesn’t make them not integrated. Even the employees say they are not separate any more, that iiNet runs the whole thing. Just because they have office space in Adelaide doesn’t mean iiNet is running the whole thing directly, they are.

The nerve centre of iiNet’s latest brand, the Internode site in Adelaide contains both the Internode contact centre and a contact centre devoted to iiNet’s core customer base.

Existing on a diet of yiros and Barossa produce, our Adelaide customer service gurus ride to work on the back of NodePonies ready to answer your every question and help you get the most out of your services.

You get put through to Perth after a certain time at night or sometimes you get them if the is a queue. By the way, how do you know they are staff dedicated to Internode? I have only found out by accident that they are iiNet staff because you tend to fill time chatting while things like DSLAM resets happen.

Back in 2011 the merge FAQ mentioned that either a call might land in IINET call centre or Node call centre

The interesting thing from a customer service point of view. Over 6 month period you have to build each contact center knowledge, training and experience to effective troubleshoot your acquired product support.

I had the recent experience of experience of being apart of company acquires a new client/business. Day One the Hobart contact center was flooded and automatically overflowed to overseas, which none of the staff had the training for and huge backlog of ticket/incident mess that took a 2 days to cleanup.

ACCC doesn’t have to squat, unless iiNet is breaching the Trade Practices Act. Or any other regulatory stipulation – where relevant.

Sorry, but just because you may not like iiNet, doesn’t mean they are automatically “deliberately misleading”.

Simon has previously stated the intention was for Internode to remain it’s own brand, since it has a strong market presence. iiNet isn’t going to delete that brand over night. No money in it.

Consolidating management and systems is where the money is. And, again, as much as you may disagree with it, as long as it’s within the current legal framework. There was always going to be some synergy of people and network at some point.

iinet and Internode had a similar customer profile; rather than compete with each other into oblivion, given the (original) scale requirements for NBNco, and the competition they faced, they merged to ensure survival. And it was pretty clear Simon Hackett, as much as it was his baby, was interested in moving on.

iinet and Internode are both strong brands, still. But to assume they would keep on competing directly against each other wouldn’t really be in line with public statements or even the point of joining forces.

The advent of the NBN, meant radical change in the market. Ironically, it may mean yet more change based on the crap-sandwich we now see the Coalition trying to gift-wrap.

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